Netherlands

There were 14,872,200 internet users in the Netherlands (representing 88.3% of the population) in June 2011, according to Internet World Stats. (Internet world Stats, August 2011)

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Of Europe's 372 million unique visitors, Netherlands accounted for 12.0 million unique visitors during August 2011, according to comScore. The country ranked second in engagement with users spending an average of 32.8 hours online in the past month, consuming 3,181 pages online. (comScore, October 2011)

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12.2 million people aged 12 to 75 years old in the Netherlands accessed the internet in 2010, according to Statistics Netherlands. This accounted for 93% of the surveyed population. (Statistics Netherlands, October 2011)

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The Netherlands ranked highest among European countries in terms of frequency of internet visitation with 78.2 visits per visitor in September 2010, according to the findings from a comScore study of internet usage in the Netherlands.

European internet users age 15 years and older accessed the internet on average 58.9 times in September 2010. The Netherlands ranked highest in Europe with 78.2 visits per visitor, nearly 20 more visits per month higher than the European average. The U.K. ranked second with 71.3 visits per visitor, followed by France (68.4 visits per visitor) and Spain (63.7 visits per visitor).

The 11.9 million internet users in the Netherlands age 6 or older spent an average of 31.9 hours online in September 2010, with the Web portals category, which includes Microsoft, Yahoo! and AOL, leading the way at 7.2 hours. Instant messengers ranked second with an average of 6.9 hours per user, followed by social networking sites, such as Hyves, Facebook and Twitter, at 3.5 hours per visitors in September. Dutch internet users spent more time on social networks than on E-mail, Multimedia, Online Gaming, Auctions or Classifieds sites.

Wolf Allisat, comScore EVP for International Markets indicated that the Dutch are rather sophisticated internet users, as evidenced by their high frequency of usage and engagement with a variety of different online content. (comScore, October 2010)

UGC and Social Media

A total of 53% of internet users in the Netherlands in 2011 reported they had been active on social networking sites like Hyves, Facebook or Twitter in the previous three months; 88% of them were under the age of 25, according to Statistics Netherlands. Additionally, one in five internet users are active on the business-related social networking site LinkedIn. (Statistics Netherlands, October 2011)

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The Dutch social networking market continues to grow strongly as sites like Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin extend their respective footprints in the market, according to comScore. The social networking market in the Netherlands is one of the few markets remaining where a local social networking player (Hyves) continues to lead Facebook, but that lead is becoming increasingly tenuous.

Another interesting facet to this market is that the Netherlands has the highest internet penetration worldwide for two of the other key global social networking sites, Twitter and LinkedIn.

Despite the overall maturity of the internet market in the Netherlands, the social networking category continues to advance, growing 18% to 11.5 million visitors in March 2011 (representing 96% of the online population). Hyves continues to hold the top position among social networking sites in the market with more than 7.6 million visitors in March, but Facebook is quickly gaining ground, surging 76% in the past year to nearly 6.6 million visitors. Twitter.com and Linkedin.com rank third and fourth, respectively, with more than 3 million visitors and each growing approximately 70% in the past year.

Top five social networking sites in the Netherlands, March 2011 (Total Netherlands, Age 15+, Home & Work Locations):
TOTAL INTERNET: TOTAL AUDIENCE: 11,953,000 (almost unchanged compared to March 2010)
Social networking: 11,490,000 (+18%)
1. Hyves: 7,650,000 (-1%)
2. Facebook.com: 6,556,000 (+76%)
3. Twitter.com: 3,207,000 (+67%)
4. Linkedin.com: 3,118,000 (+70%)
5. Windows Live Profile: 2,769,000 (-5%)

(comScore, April 2011)

Nearly 80% of internet users in the Netherlands purchased goods online in 2011, according to Statitsics Netherlands. The number of e-shoppers is marginally higher than in 2010, but the annual increase over the past two years is below the average level since 2002.

The survey found that 72% of internet users who purchased goods online in the preceding three months, the so-called frequent e-shoppers, exclusively bought new goods and 4% only bought second-hand goods. Almost a quarter did both. In 93% of cases, online shoppers buy goods from Dutch companies and individuals. Nearly one in five internet users occasionally order goods in other countries of the European Union and more than one in ten purchase products in other parts of the world. (Statistics Netherlands, October 2011)

There were over 6 million mobile internet users in the age category 12-75 years old in the Netherlands in the spring of 2011, exactly half of all 12 to 75-year-olds who indicated they used the internet in the three months prior to the survey, according to Statistics Netherlands.

The percentage of mobile internet users has increased considerably in recent years, in particular in 2010. In 2010, 36% of people online used mobile devices to access the internet. Altogether, 12.2 million people in the Netherlands accessed the internet last year, i.e. 93% of the surveyed population.

The increase in mobile internet users is predominantly due to the introduction of the smartphone. In 2011, 43% of internet users reported to use their mobile phones to access the internet, twice as many as in 2010 (21%). More than 20% of people used laptops, roughly the same percentage as in 2010, but one and a half times as many as in 2007 (13%). (Statistics Netherlands, October 2011)